2017 Edition: We review methods to price embroidery; by the job, per Item, and per stitch

Embroidery & Monogramming Pricing Fears

Embroidery and Monogramming Machine shops all over the world struggle with pricing embroidery to their customers. So, when a business is new, it seems like too much is riding on correct and accurate pricing. The result is business owners have dozens of fears regarding pricing embroidery or monogramming jobs and so let’s take a look at some of those fears and how to get past them..

Fears: If My Price is Too High

I won’t get enough business to pay my bills each month

I only get one chance at pricing jobs or they will buy elsewhere

My competitors will take my jobs if I raise my price

I will take advantage of people if my price is too high

People will think I am too proud

I will regret it if I charge too much

Fears: If My Price is Too Low

I won’t make enough to pay my bills each month

I only get one chance at pricing per stitch correctly

People will take advantage of me if my price is too low

People will think I do cheap work

I will regret I didn’t ask for more

Notice all the pressure people put on themselves about pricing? Notice how the fears and potential regrets are nearly the same in each list? Unfortunately, deciding how to price commercial embroidery machine or monogramming machine jobs can often become a huge procrastination point. But it doesn’t need to be that way. Understanding well-founded pricing models and knowing your goals up front will help remove the fears and keep your business moving forward.

To start with, it’s important to keep pricing in perspective. Learning to price embroidery and monogramming jobs correctly is only one part of reaching your overall goals.

Pricing is not the thing that will make or break your business. Pricing in the commercial embroidery and monogramming machine business is simply a tool used to help you reach your business goals and more importantly your personal goals.

Your potential in the embroidery business is only limited by your imagination, so let go of any fears you have about pricing and focus on your goals instead.

Start with your Goals in mind.

If you are at the start of a brand new embroidery business, then it can be tough to know what your goals should be. That’s OK. Start by setting some smaller goals which focus on your actions rather than on your results. Let the accomplishment of those smaller goals add up to your bigger goals.

For instance, let’s say your big goal is to hit your break-even point in your business (the point where sales cover all expenses) within the first year. Rather than focusing on a large yearly sales goal, instead chose 4 or 5 actions you can do each day, week, or month.

Here’s an Example: Pricing with Your Goals in Mind:

Make 10 outbound sales calls each day

Attend 2 business networking functions a month

Spend 1 hour a day for the first 2 months in training and learning

Take time for family each week, stop to ask how they are holding up

Explore 3 potential new vendors each week, etc

If by chance you have an existing business and have never taken the time to write down your goals, now is a perfect time to get started. Anyone who is searching for the best way to price embroidery or monogramming has a great opportunity to start making written goals. These goals will inform your pricing decisions and help you decide which pricing models to use which support your overall goals.

Price Embroidery Services and Work According to Cost, Retail or Wholesale Strategies

Understanding pricing on a more general level is important before we can discuss pricing models. So, there are three broad categories for pricing that need to be understood in order to speak the same pricing language that your customers, partners, vendors, and other colleagues will speak.

The Cost Price

Cost pricing is often the starting point of any pricing model. It’s unique for each business, and depends on many different factors that apply specifically to the individual business. Costs are classified into two broad categories and it’s important to be able to have some understanding of the differences between the two categories

Fixed Costs – any costs that do not change with an increase or decrease in the amount of the goods or services provided. These are expenses that the embroidery company has to pay regardless of if any business activity is conducted or any sale is made that month.

Typically this includes things such as rent, utilities, lease payments, monthly maintenance payments, owner’s salaries, and other fixed overhead costs. Typically, these fixed costs get tracked to each job based on a number of jobs expected for each month. For instance: if your fixed costs for a specific month are let’s say $1,450 (rent, lease payments, fixed supplies, etc.) and your Sales Volume is let’s say $5,000 then your fixed costs represent about 30% of your Sales Volume.

Imagine now if you are able to double your sales volume to $10,000. Now your fixed costs would now only add up to 15% of your Sales Volume. This will leave a larger percentage (85% instead of 70%) for cost of goods and Profits! When pricing monogramming machine jobs and items, keep in mind that any increase in sales volume effectively reduces the percentage you pay in fixed costs. Higher sales volume leaves more $$$ for higher profits!

Variable Costs- Variable costs fluctuate with production volume, they typically depend upon how much you sell or prepare to sell and how many orders you receive that month. Learning to calculate and classify the variable costs of your monogramming machine business s one of the more tedious things to get a handle on when pricing an embroidery or monogramming job. However, keep the task in perspective. It is nothing more than a gathering of the costs that change with each job. For a quick rundown of the different monogramming machines out there compared to our Avancé brand, click here to learn more.

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The Wholesale Price

The Wholesale price is what commercial embroidery and monogramming machine businesses typically pay for blank garments, thread, backing, bobbins, etc. Wholesaling is one of the steps in a typical supply chain, which includes manufacturers, distributors (blank garments) and retailers (most embroidery and monogramming machine services).

The apparel distributors typically have large warehouses locally where they store hundreds of thousands of garments which are blank and ready to be delivered to embroidery machine or monogramming machine shops in their local areas.

As a new startup or existing embroidery business owner, you can often show the wholesale company a copy of the embroidery machine invoice and be set up with a wholesale account. Having purchased a commercial monogramming machine is a good indicator to Wholesalers that you mean business. They will give you better pricing if you know how to ask.

Would you like to get a list of wholesale suppliers in your area?

Simply give us your name and email address and we will have one of our sales reps show how to go about getting wholesale accounts in your area today.

The Retail Price

Pricing for retail is how most embroidery business typically gets done. The overarching category of a typical embroidery or monogramming business is called “decorated apparel”. Business owners in the decorated apparel industry end up purchasing a monogramming machine or commercial embroidery equipment which they use to embellish custom t-shirts or polos or dress shirts, etc.

Retailers and other users purchase goods from wholesalers and then sell the products at a higher price to cover costs and generate profits. They do this by learning and using multiple pricing models.

Price Models for Machine Embroidery Jobs

There are literally dozens of ways to go about pricing machine embroidery jobs. Pricing models help business owner’s price their embroidery work by the job, by the items, or per stitch. However, there are a few particularly good pricing models that work best for an embroidery and monogramming business and we cover those here.

Keystone Pricing embroidery jobs | Keystone Plus Pricing

This is a method of pricing embroidery jobs that is often used by embroidery & monogram shop owners. It is supported across the board by many of the apparel distributors in the US.

Keystone pricing is a simple and easy to use retail pricing strategy where the end price is set at double the wholesale price. Embroidery business owners and operators are typically entitled to wholesale pricing by the companies that they get their blank garments from. Wholesale companies are not set up to deal with retail traffic and have a business model that focuses on Retail shops like those with a commercial embroidery or monogramming machine.

These wholesale companies often print their catalogs at keystone price (twice the price you pay) so that it provides a great starting point for the embroidery company when dealing with the end buyer. The embroidery business owner can simply look at the price in the catalog and can show the pricing to the end customer. They can know that there is already a fair profit built into the price to begin with.

If new to the business, this method is a great starting point. Many times shop owners will start with the keystone price and add an extra fixed price to cover the cost of the specific embellishment. Other shops prefer to use a cost per thousand stitches approach. Both are legitimate add-ons above the keystone price.

Another benefit to this model is that since the entire catalog has been printed with the keystone pricing it tends to eliminate further negotiation on the part of the customer. It’s clear to them that a great effort has been made to put the catalog together, so they figure the pricing must be accurate and non-negotiable. This works to the benefit of the embroidery business owners because they have to do little to justify their price to the end user.

However, keep in mind that this method is only a starting point. As the wholesale cost of the item increases (say Brand Name Polos and expensive Dress Shirts) then keystone and keystone plus pricing can get quite high. Competitors will often use other pricing models to justify bidding larger jobs at lower prices so when using this method, it’s important to keep the pricing conversation open with the customer and get feedback on how you’re pricing is holding up against the competition.

Lastly, Keep in mind, you are not actually calculating your costs with this method so be willing to negotiate if one of your other pricing methods or your competition indicates the price using this method is too high.

Time and Materials Price Method |For the Embroidery and Monogramming Machine Business

Time and materials billing has long been used in the commercial construction industry. By definition, it represents an agreement between the customer or end user and the company producing the product.

In the apparel business, it’s typically used for larger custom jobs which are outside of the realm of what your business typically produces. For instance, you might choose to use a Time and Materials approach to price out 100 high end leather jackets with multiple placements.

However, Time and materials is perfectly appropriate for any job you choose. If you don’t know your costs for a specific type of job, try a Time and Materials approach.

As the shop owner, you negotiate with your customer for them to agree to pay for all the materials and cost of goods used in the making of the product. In addition, they pay for the time it takes to produce the job.

Sometimes there is an additional agreed upon mark-up for profit margin added in. However more often than not all the fixed costs and the profit is included in the per hour price for the work.

For instance, if your fixed costs are say $1,450 per month and your shop is open for 40 hours a week. Then that works out to about 173 hours a month which those expenses need to be divided by, or $8.38 per hour for fixed expenses.

Using this Time and Materials approach, you may decide that you intend to make $25 per hour for your work, and another $7 per hour in profit. So the fixed costs get added to your pay plus your profits to add up to in this case to $8.38+25+7 = $40.38 per hour. This figure then becomes the agreed to per hour price for your work. It also represents the use of your equipment and resources. The customer also agrees to pay the price for materials on top of this figure.

This method insures that you get the pay you deserve for the work you do. In the case of a complex or a very large job, it makes sure you get paid enough. It also makes sure you don’t pay too high a price for not estimating a job correctly.

But it has drawbacks in that every hour the machines are not busy effectively reduces the amount of pay per hour. So you must balance your need to get paid what your worth against keeping the machines busy. If the machines aren’t busy, then you are paying for the fixed costs out of your pocket. So it’s better to keep your machines moving.

It’s possible to win the battle by having the “highest price in town”, but lose the war when the bills come in at the end of the month.

Making sure you have high profit work is the way to keep your hourly rate to a maximum. But keeping your machines busy is the way to make sure you get to keep all those high profits you earn on the jobs you do.

Cost Plus Pricing for Mongramming Machine Embroidery Items

Cost plus pricing is a more complex strategy in which the selling price is determined by adding a specific profit margin or mark-up on top of the unit costs of the goods sold. This is typically calculated for on a per job basis and it’s important to add in the fixed costs as well as the variable costs.

Cost breakdowns must be deliberately kept and comparisons made at regular intervals. This method is particularly hard for a start – up business to use because there is little data to base your job costing on. Every business has a different set of costs and those costs get lower and lower as a business grows. It is only after you have produced many jobs that you begin to get a good feel for what the final costs are for a specific niche of your business.

This pricing model is excellent however for any business that has been in business for a year or more. It’s important to go back and spot check the costs of former jobs. Doing a post mortem analysis on larger jobs or specific jobs which you believe to be the most profitable is important.

Spot checking your jobs allows you to compare the profits earned for each specific job type. The goal is to keep doing more jobs which you enjoy and make the most profits on.

Compare this method to your other methods for pricing and make sure your pricing is supporting your daily, weekly and monthly goals. For instance, let’s say your machines are so busy each month that you don’t have time to make it to business meetings. Or perhaps you are no longer able to pick up your kids from school because you are too busy.

It may be time to raise your prices so that you can work less hours but still make the same amount each month. In general, you want to raise your prices every year or so anyway. The more your customers learn to trust the quality of your work and service, then the more you can charge and still expect those customers to remain loyal.

Price to Market Method | How to Price Machine Embroidery Items in Local Markets

It’s always recommended to know your costs and to make a serious effort to add up all the costs that go into the work you are getting paid to do. However, in the beginning, as mentioned above, it can be a daunting task and this can often be a sticking point. So another method which works very well is pricing to the market.

There are all sorts of complicated ways to gather data and one can spend as much time as they want to examine every possible market influence on their local embroidery or monogramming business. However, the people who will be paying for your work are often already educated about what they are willing to pay.

Pricing to market is simply a process of asking around and shopping monogramming machine competitors in your local area and asking your potential customers what is the going rates for various jobs. The thinking is that the other businesses in your area if successful are already charging a price that sustains their businesses.

Using this method, it is assumed those prices will also sustain your business. Keeping in mind, it is sometimes an uphill battle to get an existing market to agree to pay a higher price for items or jobs they have bought for many years. So when in doubt, there is nothing wrong with using the going rates for work in your area as a starting point. However, keep your eyes open for an opportunity to add value to your monogramming machine business as you go along.

It’s important that you only compare prices with other companies in your area that offer the same level of service and product as you do. For instance, if you consistently provide a more expensive type of t-shirt than the normal for your area, then it will be important to make sure that you price according to the extra value that you bring to the local market.

Price per Thousand Stitches for Embroidery Work and Services

It has long been a standard in the embroidery industry to price jobs on a per thousand stitches basis. There is an enormous amount of pressure and opinions that develop concerning the question of what the “right” price per thousand is. Industry software has even been designed to help out which will calculate literally every single meter of thread that goes into a specific job.

The theories and calculations and arguments can get quite intense. How much fixed costs go into each stitch anyway? Are all stitches considered equal? Does each machine produce the same results? What about if I have a 4-head or a 6-head machine when another business only has a 1-head? Should I then charge less? On and on…

To begin with, it is very hard if not impossible for even industry experts to be able to guess up front from a picture how many thousand stitches a particular design will end up with. It’s not unusual to be off by 15 to 20% or more from the actual count when the job is finished. Also some jobs cause more problems than others.

Sometimes a design that looks so simple to the customer, can represent a very large amount of time spent on an embroidery machine. Sometimes a design can have a low stitch count, but be on a particular material so as to make it break thread 4 or 5 times more often. All of which is hard to judge up front. So it can leave your customer feeling like their price is always a moving target.

The important point to realize is that the “per thousand stitches” method is essentially a “Time and Materials” method. It is an attempt to break down the overall fixed costs and variable cost and reduce them all down to an amount you intend to get paid for every thousand stitches your machine produces.

The bottom line is to keep this method in perspective of your other methods and use it to compare one model to another. You may find that this method is most reliable for certain jobs (Typical polo left chest logos, etc.) but be very lacking in other jobs. That’s why it’s important to keep your pricing flexible.

Be Flexible as you Price Embroidery Work and Services for Customers

No matter which methods are used to price your machine embroidery jobs, it’s important to be flexible. All markets change. What is popular this year, may change with next year’s styles. Customers may suddenly be interested in a rare and fascinating type of garment. Be prepared to offer these unique items and make the extra profits that can be gained on these hot selling items.

Keep following up with your customers and be prepared to ask them the tough questions about your pricing so that you can match your business offerings to what your customers are buying. The customers will tell you everything you need to be successful in your business if you keep listening and are willing to adapt to their needs on a year by year basis.

Lastly, keep pricing in perspective and make sure your embroidery & monogramming machine methods are working for you. Not the other way around. Your job costing, pricing and business methods should be in alignment with your personal goals.

Pricing embroidery work and monogramming machine services for customers gets easier with time so keep at it and make sure to call ColDesi, Inc. if there are specific questions you have about pricing. Our apparel industry experts will be happy to help.

Pro Tip

Join and post in popular industry groups such as the CAS – Custom Apparel Startups Facebook Group to get specific answers to your pricing questions.

Comparing Professional Embroidery Machines

The differences in the top 5 Single Head Machines on the Market

We compare the differences among the best professional embroidery and monogramming machines in the market for 2017

Choosing the right professional embroidery machine or monogramming machine to start your new business venture, or expand your existing one, can make a huge difference in your embroidery or monogramming business.

For 2017, new updates have been made by the manufacturers and new features have been added to each brand. So, how do each of the following top professional embroidery machines stack up against each other?

Keep in mind that your business is living and growing. Even if you do not yet see a need for a specific feature, it’s possible that exact feature could have a huge impact as your business grows.

For example, the Avance 1501C has the largest jacket back size of any of the commercial single-head embroidery machines represented in this top list of single head machines. You may not have a huge call for large jacket backs now, but chances are good that you will want this and other features like it as you learn all the little tricks and techniques for using that extra size (patches, case covers, towels, etc.). It’s important to keep your options open to take advantage of new opportunities as they come along. Let’s learn how.

Here we review not only the machines and features, but the brands and the companies that sell them. We cover distribution strategies as well. There are several different distribution strategies that manufacturer’s use, and the way they go about selling makes a difference to the end user.

Support, Training and Warranty options are also HUGE factors in the long term success of your business. Many small businesses can’t get off the ground because they don’t understand their machine’s full potential.

Also, even though the embroidery machines made for the embroidery or monogramming business have similar features. They each use different methods for expressing those same features. The manufacturer may or may not emphasize particular things in their marketing.

For example; they will all embroider on caps, but cap frames may or may not be included with a particular purchase. Machine stands are typically available or included, and they all typically have some kind of tracing/laser option.

Each will usually have a “table” for embroidering on heavy items like jackets, blankets, etc., some manufacturers include these things for free and others do not.

ALL will do 3D text and small lettering – it’s just a matter of specific fonts which are included or not and the quality of the small fonts.

Lastly, all of these machines also qualify as commercial monogram machines, but are an improvement over the 6 or 10 needle monogram machines because of their larger sewing field, their more commercial construction and their capacity for 15 needles. It’s important to have multiple jobs ready pre-loaded on the embroidery machine for smoother production from job to job.

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Top 5 embroidery machine product features that are best for start-up’s

Comparing Brands and Manufacturers

The 2017 Avance machine represents the 3rd year ColDesi, Inc. has been the exclusive dealer for this world class brand. ColDesi, Inc is a 100% American owned business operating in the US for over 17 years in the industry.

They maintain a reputation of having the best service and support in the world with hundreds of hours of media, webinars, podcasts, and technical insights available for free. More people visit ColDesi operated support and educational sites worldwide than any other industry source.

ColDesi, group of companies has over 60 people on staff with a large portion of their staff working in customer support, machine preparation and training roles. ColDesi commitment to support is built right into the mission statement of the company.

In fact, the company made a decision in the fall of 2015 to shift a large portion of their marketing budget from trade shows to service and support. They instead added personnel and infrastructure to help more customers grow and be successful with their professional embroidery machines, t-shirt printing machines or bling equipment.

In our research for 2017 the Avance 1501C is the best single-head embroidery machine. Our chart shows the Avance 1501C leads in nearly every category. The Liberty Digitizing software that is normally bundled with each new machine purchase (17th version strong) is the best software. It’s clear and easy for anyone wanting to create the high quality custom digitized designs.

The quality and professionalism of the 4,400 included stock designs are considered the best in the industry. ColDesi training is absolutely unlimited which means customers can take the instructor led courses as often as they like as long as they own their machines.

There are multiple options for training, and an UNMATCHED 100% trade up guarantee for 2 YEARS towards the purchase of a 4-head or a 6-head. 2 years is well within the sweet-spot for the typical growth cycle of an embroidery business. This is when many of them will be upgrading to multihead machines and wanting to get the most value for their existing equipment. ColDesi, Inc has a clearly defined growth path for the success of their customers.

The downside to the Tajima professional embroidery machine brand is in its pricing. While certainly a respected traditional product it is price tag is up to $4,000 more than the average price of the models we are comparing here. That’s a 30% premium over the Avancé 1501C!

During the last century, the Tajima brand was the market leader in the US in terms of Market Share. They made their reputation when larger embroidery shops (those with over 100 heads of embroidery) dominated the professional embroidery and monogramming business. That’s where their good reputation started. Since then, Tajima has been in rebuilding mode facing stiff competition and a market that values flexibility and value.

The 2017 new Tajima embroidery machine touts a few good features and a larger embroidery field than the model previously reviewed.

The Barudan machine is one of the two most expensive brands in the industry. Also getting its start in many large factories in North Carolina where the machine is distributed, the Barudan brand has been known as one of the top brands in the industry and has an astronomical price tag to match.

Having pioneered some of the major improvements in the industry in the past, the brand is somewhat in maintenance mode now. The manufacturer has stuck to incremental design changes for over 10 years. Operators in larger factories are often familiar with the brand. However, it’s lack of largest jacket back size, it’s limited included software, and the lack of comprehensive videos and training materials make it much less attractive for those who are just expanding their business OR starting with a single head professional embroidery or monogramming machine.

Happy has carried over the ala cart feature and accessory attitude from their consumer products into their HCD2 professional embroidery machine.

Happy is well known for its home embroidery machines or expensive consumer machines similar to the Brother PR1000e Entrepreneur Pro. Along with their multi-needle home the Japanese conglomerate that owns Happy now makes a 15 needle commercial machine, the HCD2.

The lack of included hoops, smaller jacket back size, and the rather simplistic “Stitch N Sew” software tend to keep the machine in the wheelhouse of the home styled machines. This is somewhat surprising considering the machine is priced higher than the other commercial machines listed.

Melco has changed ownership recently and now shares its product line with a consumer line of embroidery machines. Careful with distribution here – make sure if you buy from a home sewing and vacuum sales outlet that you get commercial level training.

The Melco emt16 has an appealing look, somewhere between the consumerist packaging of the Brother Entrepreneur Pro and the more industrial Avancé and Tajima brands. The pricing is also attractive at slightly under the average here.

The biggest drawback may be that the Table Attachment is optional – makes doing large items more difficult and adds to the complete product price. However, the fact that the machine requires the computer to remain operational can mean that if your Windows based computer crashes, it could affect the machine or sew out.

The Brother PR1000e, or Entrepreneur Pro, is a consumer embroidery machine that has been positioned as an entry into the commercial marketplace. Unfortunately, even with a beautiful LCD menu screen and some clever features, it lacks some of the basics that commercial and professional embroidery machines should have.

The PR1000e has the smallest sewing field, is lacking in included supplies, no hoops included, no stand, only 10 needles as opposed to 15+, no trade in, only a 2 year warranty.

In fact, the only reason this unit is included in the comparison is because of its retail price, at almost $12K, and offer’s home embroidery machine owners essentially a more expensive home machine for their upgrade path. If additional growth in your business and being able to satisfy all the requests of your customers is important. Consider another brand. That’s our recommendation here.

Why Sewing Field Matters

Here’s 5 market segments where sewing field size make a HUGE Impact

There are several pricing models used by embroidery professionals, but they all have one thing in common; the bigger the design, the bigger the price. The bigger the price, the more dollars you get to keep at the end of the month.

With a large sewing field you can make more money with each change of the hoop. Large beautiful designs sew longer, require less operator time, and attract the types of customers who are willing to pay top dollar for their customer Jackets and Patches.

Learn More About The Avancé 1501C

Jacket backs and Patches require the largest sewing field and a strong and sturdy hoop to match. They are very popular and profitable projects for embroidery. Here are just a few examples:

School and Letterman Jackets

Military & Police Backs & Patches

Baseball club windbreakers

Golf jackets

Motorcycle club jackets and vests

Sports & Club Jackets

Not only is a large sewing field a huge money maker, but the large field size showcases your capabilities, attracts higher quality customers and helps you win jobs you had not expected.

For example, if your main competitor was using an Amaya XTS machine and you owned an Avancé 1501C, you could offer a 45% LARGER DESIGN. Which do you think a customer would prefer? They both take the same amount of time to hoop and load.

But don’t take our word for it. Speak to an embroidery industry professional about which system is right for your business. Use the links at the side to learn more, or dial the phone number above to speak with an industry advisor now.

Distribution Strategies

Where You BUY your embroidery machine matters

There’s a difference between how you use a system for home or hobby use, obviously, and what kind of dealership you buy from as well.

There are really 3 kinds of distribution strategies that commercial manufacturers are using in today’s marketplace:

Sewing Center Sales

Regional Distribution

Single Point

Sewing Centers are the places where many professionals that started as hobbyists get interested in embroidery as a business. They have classes on embroidery, sewing, quilting and crafts and often sell very expensive, higher end equipment for those purposes. The advantage to sewing centers is that you have a built in supportive community. BUT, a community of hobbyists and consumer equipment is probably not going to be helpful in starting an actual contract or custom embroidery business. The EMT16 from Melco Amaya, for example, is distributed in this way.

DO YOU REALLY WANT TO BUY YOUR BUSINESS EQUIPMENT WHERE YOU CAN ALSO GET A GOOD DEAL ON A VACUUM FOR YOUR HOME?

Regional Distribution can come in several forms, mostly depending on the size of the regions. Fundamentally, these are companies that only sell commercial equipment, are used to dealing with and supporting commercial customers. The different forms come with how large the region is and whether or not they are exclusive. A regional distributor for Brother, for example, might sell all of their equipment brands and may just be an embroidery system distributor as part of the package. The biggest disadvantage in some of these businesses is that you will be dealing iwth their local shop instead of corporate for support – this could be an advantage as well depending on the reputation of the manufacturer.

Single Point Distribution are where the manufacturer selects, or develops for itself, a single sales and support arm for its product. Basically, you are shopping at what amounts to a Factory Store. Imagine buying a car or appliance directly from the maker without having to go through a local dealer. Everyone you deal with will be an expert, or at least will be focused on the product you’re purchasing.

You also get dedicated, well trained support personnel and, usually, better training and service options as well. Pricing for equipment sold in the Single Point Distribution model is normally better than with the other strategies because your closer to the supply chain origin. The fewer middle men between you and the product, the better the fewer times the items is marked up.

ColDesi, Inc. is the sole reseller of the Avancé product line in the Americas

In addition to the Avancé, ColDesi is also the only distributor for CAMS Automatic Rhinestone Machines, ProSpangle Bling Machine and the DTG brand of direct to garment printers. This allows us to offer the absolute best support and training!

When You Grow

Many beginning embroidery companies are caught by surprise at how fast their business can ramp up and grow. Normally, that’s a good thing, but if you purchase equipment with immediate needs in mind with no thought of expansion or success it can cause some real issues.

Issues with Growth

Equipment Fatigue – If you made the choice to spend as little money as possible up front and went with a more consumer embroidery machine you will quickly find that the components and construction just aren’t up to high volume work.

Software – A basic embroidery application might be fine for a low volume shop, but as you get busier and earn more business you will need more capabilities – consider an upgrade to a software package like Sierra Stitch Era

Training Employees – one of the first steps to growing is adding a person or people to actually run the equipment while you run the business – free ongoing and self-paced training classes are vital! ColDesi offers them free for the life of your machine.

Adding and Upgrading – once your business is ready to expand in capabilities you’ll need to look into adding more “heads” to your operation through upgrading or adding on. Networkable machines, like the Avancé 1501C, allow you to purchase another machine and hook it up to the same computer that your 1st one is connected to so you get a 2 head or dual function system. Great for production!

On the other hand…

Avancé also offers a 100% trade up program for 2 years. That means that if you’re ready for a 2 head, 4 head or 6 head machine within 2 years of your purchase you get 100% of the value towards your new machine!

Ready to Start or Expand Your Embroidery Business?

Chat with us below, call us at 877-793-3278 or click button and let us help you get your business growing.

Comparing Single Head vs. Multi-head Machines

Return on Investment

The Avancé embroidery machine line is a serious game-changer in the professional embroidery machine market. The brand’s low price is combined with the highest quality parts and TONS of great features.

Each machine comes standard with 15 needles, a large sewing field and full color LCD monitors. Plus, single-heads come with a 2-year trade up program that cannot be found anywhere else. Add to that the industry’s best training and support and it’s easy to see why the Avancé brand is the right choice for professional embroidery machine owners who are looking for the best return on investment.

Here we compare line by line the costs and profits that EACH level of machine provides. We compare single-head VS multi-head options to help you decide which machine makes the most sense for your professional embroidery business.

Production Time Comparison

Let’s compare a sample logo design. You can see the image of the Avancé 1501C control panel on the right already loaded with the ColDesi logo design.

This logo file is 9,970 stitches, and as you can see the speed is set for 750 stitches per minute, which is average for this type of sew out.

To get an estimate of how long it will take to embroider each design, just divide the number of stitches by the stitches per minute:

9,970 stitches/750 stitches per minute = 13.29 minutes to completion

This calculation is just an estimate because it does not allow for thread color changes, geography of the design, etc. When we ran this design for the video on the right, it took almost exactly 15 minutes to run.

The sample order we’ll use for comparison is embroidering this ColDesi logo onto 50 garments.

Single Head Results

To complete this job with a single head Avancé 1501C professional 15 need machine would take:

1 garment in 15 minutes = approximately 4 per hour50 garments/4 per hour = 12.5 Hours to complete the order

When using a 4-head machine, like the Avancé 1504 shown in the other demonstration video on your right, the set-up time is comparable.

You load the design into the control panel in a similar way and hooping your garments takes the same amount of time each. BUT the math is much different!

Multi Head Results

New for 2017
Introducing the Avancé 1502 2 Head Professional Embroidery Machine

Choosing the 2-head machine up front is like getting an instant efficiency upgrade. Labor costs per head are nearly halved, and there is nearly $3,000 savings per head compared to networked single-head machines.

Jobs load up the same way as a single head and color selection is handled the same. The 2 head machine can be placed on a table top or counter if needed and while much heavier, it can be transported to retail events to maximize your output and profits. The Avancé 1502 is a great upgrade which helps you get paid at twice the rate of single heads.

4 Head Production Comparison

With the 4-head machine, you are just loading the design once, then embroidering 4 garments simultaneously. Now you will produce 4 garments in that same 15 minutes!

4 garments in 15 minutes = 16 garments per hour50 garments/16 per hour = slightly more than 3 hours to complete the order

In that one, long 12.5-hour day I could either complete ONE 50 garment order on a single head or FOUR of them on the 4-head machine. You will literally make FOUR TIMES THE SALES in the same amount of time.

The 1506C Difference

Guess what happens when you choose a 6-head professional embroidery machine like the Avancé 1506C?

The math just gets better because the time it takes to complete each design is constant, but the number of designs you can produce in the same period increases by the number of heads. Our ColDesi logo job that we’ve been comparing changes in this way:

6 garments in 15 minutes = 24 garments per hour

50 garments/24 per hour = a very little more than 2 hours to complete the order

Now how I can produce 6 times the number of garments in that long 12.5-hour day, which means I can make more than SIX TIMES THE SALES with the 1506C than I would with the 1501C.

The Avancé 1506C – Compact 6 head professional embroidery machine comes with on-site installation and training.

Productivity vs. Price

Let’s compare this in an even more important way, because how many jobs you can do in an hour, or day or week, is the limit of how much money you can make in the embroidery business.

Save more by upgrading now

Instant Upgrade to 1502:Saves about $3,000 per head

Upgrade to 1504:Saves about $4,800 per head

Upgrade to 1506:Saves over $6,000 PER HEAD Wow!

** Compared to individual networked single-heads.

Commercial Machine Price Comparison

We’ve seen very clearly what the productivity benefit is when you upgrade to a 4 or 6 head unit from the 15 needle single head, but what about the pricing?

Budget aside, when comparing prices of multi head systems the most useful comparison to make is “price per head”.

The table above clearly shows what a value the multi head machines are in a price comparison.

The value of the single head machine is the MSRP, but you are paying almost 40% less per head for the 4-head machine and over 51% less with the 6 head.

The Avancé 1506C is TWICE the value per head of the 1501C when you look at it this way

Sales & Marketing Advantages

Of course, you can obviously start your business and make a good living with your single head professional machine, but there are distinct advantages to a multi head bringing in more business as well as producing it.

Turnaround Time

The ability to do 4x or 6x the work in the same time means that you can offer what many other embroiderers cannot; faster delivery. Imagine a business shopping for 100 polos embroidered with their company logo and the difference between offering to complete the order in 4 hours with your 6 head or in 6 hours with your 4-head machine vs. a 3 or 4-day delivery.

Business Image

There is no question that the Avancé 1501C is a high quality commercial machine. It’s obviously built well and looks like a real piece of business hardware. But it’s also constructed in a small format so it fit in a small home or side office and can even roll into a closet when not in use. If your website or company brochures have pictures of a 1504 or 1506C, which are larger and have a much more industrial look you may get larger clients and more work. Perceived capabilities are important for marketing! Also consider the impression made if a potential client visits your place of business and how the Multihead will appear vs. the single head machine.

Embroidery Return on Investment

There are many factors that go into the sales and profitability of your new embroidery business, here are just a few:

Will you work from home, lease warehouse space or be in a retail environment?

What is your local competition like?

Will you be a one person show or hire employees?

What will your pricing strategies be?

Are you taking a salary?

Can you manage your business expenses?

The ROI of your equipment purchase will be influenced by all those factors and more, but we can make some simple estimates based on the things discussed in this article and a few assumptions.

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Assumption #1

You can make $40/hour running a single head Avancé – which is a common goal in the embroidery business for startups.

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Assumption #2

You can fill 40 hours of work with business – this is less likely when you first start out and much more likely as you grow your business. You can change this number to do your own estimates.

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Assumption #3

You are charging $1.25 per thousand stitches. We recommend using the Market Down pricing model described in this article, but that means customizing this scenario by local market, which we can’t do here. The $1.25/m is a mid-range price derived from a quick survey of our own embroidery pros.

Let’s use that ColDesi logo job as our example again:

At approximately 8000 stitches x $1.25 per thousand you would charge $10 for each finished design. You can finish 4 designs per hour, so running this on your single head machine would mean revenues of $40/hour.

Here’s another table to compare your potential income depending on the machine you are using:

See How To Price Embroidery

We did a complete guide to pricing that shows you the different formulas for pricing embroidery work.

Using these figures, you can see that if you can keep your machines running for 40 hours per week, you can make $1,600/week with your single head machine and up to $9,600/week with your 1506C!

24 designs per hour x 8 hours per day = 192 designs/day

192 designs x $10 each = $1,920/day in sales

$1,920/day x 5 days = $9,600 per week

The Avancé 1506C is $23,000 more than the 1501C single head embroidery machine, so that means a much bigger investment up front. But as you can see above, you can also make up to an additional $8,000/week with the 1506C so it will take you less than 3 weeks of sales to pay for the difference in machine price.

Estimating Your ROI Numbers

These scenarios and pricing are all made to be as simple and clear as possible and represent an ideal business. Some designs need to be run slower; you may encounter production delays for maintenance or repairs. On the other hand, it does not take into consideration the profit on the blank shirts, the fact that you can be more profitable with caps, or any number of factors that may make your results idea. But they are as true and accurate as we could make them and represent good information to help you make your buying decision!

Ready to Start or Expand Your Embroidery Business?

Chat with us below, call us at 877-793-3278 or click button and let us help you get your business growing.

Brainstorming ways to make money with your commercial embroidery machine.

ColDesi has sold thousands of embroidery machines to entrepreneurs launching new businesses or expanding existing ones. It seems that everyone interested in starting in the custom apparel world has at least one great idea, and sometimes more, but they also ALWAYS ask what else they can do.

You can approach your business either with an Item specialty, like embroidering on Caps or Hats, or a Vertical Market focus. A vertical market is a general industry, like athletic wear, baby clothes and accessories, etc. We gathered all of our answers together with our customers own ideas and came up with these 35 Embroidery Business Ideas to share with you. They’re broken up into Items for inspiration and Markets

Embroidery is a versatile and potentially very profitable business to get into, and all you really need is the right idea, the right commercial embroidery machine and the right strategy to market your abilities. We hope this brainstorming session helps get you started in the right direction!

Ready to Start or Expand Your Embroidery Business?

Chat with us below, call us at 877-793-3278 or click button and let us help you get your business growing.

Commercial Embroidery Machine for StartUps

What makes the Avancé the Best Value for StartUps?

ColDesi has 15 years of experience in helping entrepreneurs start new embroidery businesses, both home based and retail oriented stores. Our employees, including professional account managers and the best support technicians in the business have more than 500 years of collective experience in getting businesses started and keeping them running profitably based on professional embroidery systems.

3 Reasons the Avancé 1501C the BEST choice for Commercial Embroidery Startups

#1

Right Features

The ability to embroider on Caps – cap or hat embroidery is a very popular and very profitable part any custom apparel business. The 1501C lets you create large, almost wrap around designs for your customers.

15 needle configuration. Professional embroiderers know that you’ll keep 6-8 primary colors on your machine at all times. Then, once you get a few customers coming back, you’ll have plenty of room to store their most common choices. 15 needles on a commercial embroidery machine means 15 different colored cones of thread, and that translates into big time savings for you.

Portability is key. The Avancé 1501C (“C” stands for Compact) is one of the most portable machines on the market because it comes with feet already installed. Many machines, like the Tajima and SWF, are mounted with bolts directly to the wheeled cart they come with. That means you have to uninstall and reinstall every time you want to take your machine on the road. Not so with Avancé!

Of course, the high grade steel stand, on casters, comes with the unit, so a StartUp working from a bedroom office can just wheel it into a closet when not in use.

Professional digitizing software. Stitch Era Universal from Sierra is a full featured digitizing software that will allow you to test the limits of your creativity. There’s also a clear upgrade path to even more powerful versions when your needs expand.

Free Embroidery Designs are included. You get more than 4,000 designs with every machine. That means you don’t have to start from scratch with the basics.. like baseballs, footballs, boats, and a wide variety of other embroidery “clip art”. You can get started right away!

Memory. Believe it or not, there are still commercial embroidery machines on the market that can’t store your designs on board. This is important, because it’s so much faster and simpler to just select from regular customers’ designs from the control panel and sew rather than have to go back to your computer to complete the job. The 1501C will store up to 200 designs right on the machine itself.

#2

Best Training and Support

Training is vital, especially if you’re new to the business of apparel decorating. ColDesi not only has qualified, experienced people waiting to train you on your new software and equipment – we have a whole training SYSTEM designed to get you up and running.. and KEEP you there!

Live Online Training – This is by far the most popular choice for our customers! You receive your new single head machine and sign up for our lead trainer to take you through EVERYTHING live online. There are slides to give you the information, videos to show you how to do it, then you’ll do the exercise on your own machine. Our trainer is on line with you the whole time!

Self – Paced Training – maybe you have some experience on machines like this one, or need to help a new employee get started embroidering. In that case you can go through our Self-Pace training with videos and information ready when you are.

In House – If you really think you’ll need that extra, hands on attention you can join one of our classroom training sessions in one of our locations.

Free Tech Support as long as you own your machine. This is not just a technician on the other end of your phone call, we’ve got a sophisticated support system that starts with HUNDREDS of videos and an autoresponse mechanism that actually sends you the most likely resolution to your issue automatically so you don’t have to wait.

#3

Amazing Trade Up Guarantee

Avancé Grows with You

ColDesi is so confident in the quality of the machine itself, and in its usefulness to your embroidery business startup, that we offer something no one else in the industry can… a 2 year 100% Trade Up Guarantee!

When your new business takes off and you need to go from a single head to a multi head embroidery machine, like the 1502, 1504 or 1506C, we’ll give you 100% of what you paid for the 1501C in trade. That is an AMAZING commitment from ColDesi! You can use your machine for 2 years and it’s worth exactly the same as it was NEW.If you want to expand, but don’t need to grow all at once you can take advantage of Avancé Networking – you can actually buy a 2nd, 3rd or 4th single head commercial embroidery machine and put them all on the same network so they ACT like a multi head.

Impressive, right? Start Up NOW Don’t wait. Contact us right away and get your business started with Avancé and ColDesi by filling out the form here

Introducing Avancé – Best commercial embroidery machine for the price.

FREE E-Book – Starting A Custom T-Shirt Business

ColDesi’s staff has a combined experience of more than 500 years in the apparel decorating industry. Learn from the Pros with valuable information before you get started.

Buying a Business or Starting One?

Many entrepreneurs, or people looking into starting their own business, struggle with the decision on whether or not to buy and embroidery machine and start their own company or look into an embroidery business for sale. There are pros and cons to each, but if do evaluate an embroidery business for sale vs. buying a new embroidery machine and creating a business yourself. Take a look at the following points:

What are you actually buying? When you buy a commercial embroidery or custom t-shirt business, it’s not just the value of the equipment that needs to be evaluated, it’s the business itself.

Is there a lease on the Equipment and Fixtures or is it is paid for?

What is the remaining warranty on the equipment? Is there a service contract with time left on it?

Where will you get training on running your new machines when you purchase the business?

Is the person listing the Embroidery Business for Sale the owner or a broker? Who pays the commissions?

Can they produce good quality books (accounting records) that clearly show profits? Salaries?

What kind of “good will” are you buying? In other words, will the embroidery businesses customers stay with the business, or will they leave because of the personal connection with the owners?

Do they have a website, Facebook page or any other marketing presence that you’ll get with the business?

The big question that you need answered first is: WHY IS THE EMBROIDERY BUSINESS FOR SALE? Is it not profitable? Have sales been decreasing? are the owners retiring?

Oftentimes owners of existing small businesses have built the business up to the point of providing themselves with a lifestyle rather than an ever growing business. Their standards might be to just pay their mortgage, their expenses and to work in a business they enjoy. Are theirs the same as yours?

Of course you CAN find a good embroidery business for sale out there, but the odds of finding one that’s run well, run profitably and positioned for growth in the city, town or neighborhood you want to be in. .at the exact time that you’re ready to start a business, are very, very low!

Staring an embroidery business or buying one from someone else are both big decisions, and ColDesi is here to help!

Ready to Start or Expand Your Embroidery Business?

Chat with us below, call us at 877-793-3278 or click button and let us help you get your business growing.

What to look for in a used commercial or professional embroidery machine.

It’s so tempting. You’re in the start up or expansion phase of your new embroidery business, looking for the right machine to power your future success, and you go to any list of commercial embroidery equipment and immediately sort by “price”, lowest to highest.

You could be looking on eBay, or Amazon, or you end up on Alibaba, and the array of different brands, needles, configurations, software, and warranty is daunting. That’s not even including the new vs. used decision you have to make!

In the next few paragraphs we’ll outline the pros and cons of buying a used embroidery machine for your business – and having taken in hundreds of embroidery machines on trade over the years, having sold professional embroidery machines, new and used, in the thousands since 1999, ColDesi has developed some real expertise in the area. Hopefully, the information provided will guide you to the best way to start your new embroidery business.

Professional Machine Features

The first thing that you must do when looking into a used machine, or new for that matter, is make a clear differentiation between professional and consumer. Here are some of the characteristics of a professional unit:

Robustness – commercial quality means that the machine will run all day, every day and not wear out or break down. Consumer machines aren’t made to run larger designs, or multiple designs, that may take 2-6 hours to embroider in one stretch. You can usually just “feel” this – just like closing the door on a high end vehicle, you can tell when there’s quality.

Multi-needle – You may be used to a high end home embroidery machine, and what you can accomplish with a good one is pretty impressive. BUT, if you are going into business you simply must be able to produce a multicolor design or logo as quickly and efficiently as possible, and even a $6,000 consumer single needle machine just won’t cut it.

Large Sewing Field – the sewing field is the size limit to the design you can embroider, or if you’re creating patches it is the number of them you can produce in one job. A small sewing field will rule out larger, more profitable jacket back designs, custom handbag designs and more.

Training and Support – when you go into business, you can’t afford to leave questions unanswered or open your doors unprepared. When you purchase a commercial embroidery machine product the dealer/vendor/manufacturer understands that this is a business and you can’t be down. Because of this, you typically get a better educated, better prepared person on the other end of the phone when you need help.

Auto Trim, large design memory, limitless number of stitches, warranty are all less obvious, but equally important differentiators between consumer and professional systems.

Don’t be fooled by big LED control panels, onboard fonts or just plain good looks of a high end consumer machine!

What Is Included With The Machine

Most people are surprised, if they have never been in the embroidery business, at the impact and the cost of accessories and software. When you’re running an embroidery business, you’re going to want 2 of each kind of hoop; one to sew on, and one to load while the other one sews so there’s no down time between jobs. You will also want the RIGHT sized hoop for the job, so that means at least 10 hoops in your inventory. Hoops range from about $30 to $90, so that can quickly add another $400 – $600 to your costs if they don’t come with the machine.

Does the used embroidery machine come with hoops?
The other thing that’s vital to running your business is the digitizing software or embroidery software. There are a wide variety of applications on the market that allow you to create files on your computer that you will be embroidering for your customer’s jobs. The software applications all have slightly different features, and possibly huge differences in capabilities. In addition, some software applications are difficult or even impossible to transfer from one owner to the next.

Does it come with transferable digitizing software?
Custom caps and hats are a hot business in the embroidery world! You cannot go to a mall without seeing a custom cap shop or kiosk, and caps are a huge market for businesses as well. Did you know that not all professional embroidery machines do caps well? And your used machine may not come with the “cap drivers” (hoops) to embroider on hats. This would represent a huge hole in your potential sales and profits!

Will it do Caps, and come with the right drivers?
Supplies and sundries can not only add up in costs, but NOT having all that you need in the beginning can slow your growth and delay profitability. When you purchase a new piece of equipment from a reputable dealer or manufacturer it almost always comes with a large enough supply package to do your first few jobs.

The scenario you will want to avoid as a new business is to get that first order, then realize you don’t have the right kind of backing or toppings on hand and not fill it on time! Even the Essentials Kit from Colman and Company, which is the minimum you’ll need start, is $299 and the Popular Embroidery Kit is $499 – both are a great deal, but you need to keep that cost in mind when you’re comparing a new embroidery machine vs. used.

We’ve seen that it’s clearly not just enough to purchase the machine itself. When you’re comparing new vs. used, make sure you find out what comes with it.

Best Value For Start Ups

Starting an embroidery business requires knowing which type of machine best fits your needs.

How Old is the Machine?

There are hundreds of SWF, Tajima, ZSK (compare the top 5 machines here) and other solid brand embroidery machines that were first sold in the early 2000s or earlier that are still going strong. But there are several things that they may not, or simply cannot have that will make a significant difference to your business.

Floppy drives – on many professional systems you do your design work on a PC, then carry your files to the embroidery machine, load them up and go. Up until just a few years ago machines came with 3.5” floppy disc drives to transfer those files. Floppies are getting harder and harder to find, replace or repair. Modern systems use a USB.

Memory – newer machines have built in memory in addition to being able to use external storage, that way you can keep your regular customer’s designs right on the machine, ready to go at any time.

Display control panel – current systems have a visual display that will let you SEE the design before outputting. Just to make sure you have the right one!

Maintenance options – regular maintenance procedures have been streamlined over the years due to automatic oiling systems. Older ones may take you a little longer.

Parts – the older the machine, the less likely you’ll find new factory parts if you have an issue.

Will the Used machine come with Training, Warranty, Support?This set of reasons is why, if you do purchase a used embroidery machine, you simply must do it through a qualified dealer!

Do you already know how to use the digitizing software, hoop a cap, change from flats to caps, which backing to use for which garment?

Where will you go if you have technical problems?

What to do if the machine keeps breaking needles, or just stops working?

Are there training videos? Someone you can call?

What if you expand and need to train someone new?

Can you afford a major repair right after you purchase?

Buying Used can save you hundreds, if not thousands of dollars in the initial machine cost, but it may cost you thousands more in lost productivity, repair costs or just lost business because you’re not prepared. If you are considering a used commercial embroidery machine, make sure you review the points made in this Buyer’s Guide, then talk to a professional about your options.

Ready to Start or Expand Your Embroidery Business?

Chat with us below, call us at 877-793-3278 or click button and let us help you get your business growing.